As Danny Phantom
by VegetaCold
Summary: Yaoi, VladXDanny. Please read and review if you're into this kind of thing. If not, read it anyway.
1. Chapter 1

As Danny Fenton, I was, or so I thought, about as normal a teenage boy as I could be. I spent too much time playing computer games and watching TV, got relatively low grades, and watched the hot girls at our school—mostly Paulina—with glazed over eyes and mouth open, drooling slightly. Yes, as Danny Fenton, I'm a bit of a playboy. In fact, I keep my Playboys hidden conveniently in my math book and ogle at them while Mr. Lancer prattles on about finding the value of _x_, as if I cared. I had dreams of making love to Paulina, of caressing her soft breasts and exploring the inside of her mouth with my tongue. It was my ultimate sexual fantasy as Danny Fenton.

However, as Danny _Phantom_, it was not. As my alter-ego Danny Phantom, my preference as to what was best to masturbate to changed. Drastically. As Danny Phantom, I saw Paulina but there was no stiffening of my cock beneath my jeans. Sam could stay by my side and aide me while I fought my ghost enemies, but my heart no longer fluttered in my chest, a flutter that soon dropped to a deep thudding as I stared at her, wishing she'd take off those tights and show off her long legs.

As Phantom, I felt none of these sensations; instead, it was like this:

I had first noticed the drastic shift a few weeks ago when I'd been roaming the town's empty streets late one Thursday night, looking for ghost activity to stomp out like an ill-advised cop. It was extremely quiet, probably the most quiet it had been in months.

Feeling my patrolling was useless—and knowing I had two tests and a presentation to give the next day—I decided to turn in. it must have been midnight when I started the trek back to my house, which was maybe four or five blocks away.

I had not gotten far when I saw him. Vlad Masters, our town's mayor, also in his ghost form, sitting on a bench in the park, smoking a cigarette and expelling the smoke in long, deep puffs of breath.

I was confused to say the least; I didn't know he smoked.

He looked very relaxed, but he was somehow very alert. His eyes were bleary and the lids were half closed, but his gaze found me immediately, standing maybe a football field's length away from him. He regarded me for a long moment, his drunken expression unchanging, then closed his eyes and took another deep drag on his cigarette.

He took his hand away, leaving the cigarette burning in his mouth, then crossed his muscular arms over his chest. His legs were also crossed casually, and he was slumping. He kept his eyes closed as he took now small, quick puffs on the cigarette—I guessed it was easiest to smoke it that way if he wasn't holding it, but then, I had never smoked, so I didn't know—, completely ignoring me.

It didn't necessarily make me hostile—I was glad he wasn't attacking and I wasn't suspicious. Our relationship had come to something of commensalism—a term I'd learned in Biology class when I wasn't finding my issue of Playboy to be particularly interesting, which supposedly meant one organism benefits while the other is neither harmed nor helped. I thought that term best described Vlad and I now, because while he lived in and benefited because of my town, I was more or less forced to accept his presence—but he was not hurting me.

Often, I saw him on my way home from school or our paths crossed at the mall or the gas station. Of course, I was not pleased at seeing him, but I would not go out of my way to snarl if he was not bothering me. I would leave my face expressionless, even though he always smiled at me. When we did see each other, he always made an effort to nod in greeting and he would often pat my back or squeeze my shoulder as he passed by me. In turn, I usually said nothing. I figured that as long as he was not hitting me, it didn't bother me very much. However, one time it did.

I remember I'd been leaning against the counter in Amity's one and only gas station, flipping through a new issue of Playboy, when he walked in. I didn't realize it was him, because I did not look up from the woman in the issue I was ogling at until I felt four fingers brush my erect cock very lightly. I yelped slightly and looked up to see Vlad walking away from me toward the refrigerator cases. He didn't turn and look back at me, and he didn't look suspicious—in fact, he looked very relaxed—but we were the only two in the store besides the cashier who was in the bathroom, so I called out, "What the fuck's your problem, asshole?"

Vlad paused and turned around. He was smiling a little. "Hmm?"

"You touched my cock!"

"Oh, did I?"

"Yes!"

He smiled at me. "I'm sorry, Daniel. I didn't mean to."

I sneered in disgust. "You'd better not have. I realize you're still a virgin, but you're not getting _anything _from me."

He laughed, his face lighting up, and turned away, waving a hand in dismissal. He picked out a bottle of iced tea from the case. "Oh, aren't you a funny boy. And horny. Are you enjoying your Playboy, little badger?"

For some reason, this made me harder. I blushed. "I…uh…"

He closed the case, turned, and walked over to me with a broad smirk on his face. When he was so close I could feel his warm breath stirring the spikes of hair on my head, he leaned down and regarded my front for what seemed like a humiliating eternity. I was about to shove him away when he looked back up at my face, smiled, and ruffled my hair. He then took his tea to the counter, set it down, and stood there, waiting for the cashier to return.

"I assume you've lost your virginity then, Danny?"

"Well…no…"

He paused for a moment, then turned to look at me. He was smirking and his eyes were wide and glowing with something. Then I could not decipher this _something_, but I knew it was deep and passionate and longingly but somehow indecent. I should have known the word; it should have rolled off my tongue, because I had plenty of it for the hot bodies in my magazines. I know now what I should have known then—it was lust.

This was really the only time he'd genuinely bothered me, but I convinced myself he had not purposefully touched me in such a way, had not looked lecherously at me at learning of my virginity. It had been a month or so ago, and after awhile, I'd mostly forgotten about the incident, because our later run-ins had been completely PG.

I guess I'd been comfortable enough with him then, and that night I walked over to him instead of going home, as I should have—and I regret not doing so. I guess I'd been curious as to why he was out smoking in the park at midnight on a Thursday like one of Amity's hoods, so I thought there was no harm in stopping to ask.

But there was. It was the mistake that condemned my life thenceforth.

* * *

I stood in front of him until he acknowledged me.

He slowly opened his eyes and stared at me, his face unchanging for a long time, his body unmoving. Then, he smiled slightly, unfolded his arms, and removed the cigarette from his mouth.

"There you are," he said softly. "I've been waiting."

"Waiting?"

"For you to come over."

"Oh."

"Why don't you sit down?"

"I just came to ask why you were out so late," I said slowly, regarding him with uncertain—and probably scared-looking—eyes.

"Sit down and I'll tell you."

"I really have to get home."

"Come now, a few minutes won't make a difference. Now be a good boy and sit down."

Slowly, I did, despite the fact that I was extremely uncomfortable. Something about how he was talking to me, how soft his voice was or maybe how it sounded like he was purring, or how he was choosing his words, but it made me uncomfortable. I'm not sure how I made myself sit down, or why, but this, I think, was the ax that beheaded me.

He smiled and patted my knee after I was situated next to him. Then he leaned back again and his focus seemed to drift away from me again. He stared off into the distant woods blankly, taking long, deep drags on his cigarette. I watched him from the corner of my eye, avoiding direct contact for fear he'd see me and come back into reality, and wondered how I would get home when he seemed so intent on keeping me here; when I tried to move slightly away from him, the hand that did not hold the cigarette fell on my knee and stayed there. I did not think it directly, but I knew in the back of my mind that I was trapped.

"Vlad, I really need to get home," I said nervously after ten minutes of sitting there stiff as a statue.

He finally looked at me, his hard, calculating expression softening. He shook his head. "You don't."

"I do. I have to get up for school in five hours."

"I can get you out of school, Danny."

"It's cold."

"How about a drag? It will warm you up."

My eyes widened unconsciously. I shook my head. "I don't smoke."

"It will help you relax. You need to relax. I can sense your uneasiness." His fingers began to stroke the inside of my lower thigh, where his hand was resting, gently.

I shot up. "I have to…"

He pulled me back down, onto his lap, and wrapped his arms around me. "Stay here. Relax. There's no need to be worried, my little badger."

I felt his warm breath on the back of my neck, and when I felt him nip my ear, I remembered the gas station, and I knew the word.

_Lust_.


	2. Chapter 2

I felt his sharp teeth gently nibbling at my ear, and my body went rigid. His teeth were wet and his tongue was poking into the flesh there—whether he was doing this purposely or the slimy appendage ended up there by default, I didn't know—and the sensation prompted me to squirm, but I made myself stay still. I knew how sharp his fangs were, and I was frankly afraid if I squirmed he might accidentally—or perhaps on purpose—bite down. He could puncture my eardrum, or some vital organ or vein beneath the skin on my neck, although I didn't know exactly what that would be—I'm not exactly an a-plus student.

I guess it hadn't occurred to me that I could have easily gone intangible and slipped out of his hands, but my mind was racing and I was incapable of such degree of thought, even though I could recognize that there was a danger in squirming—maybe it was easier to think in the moment, rather than in the long-run, for me, at least.

"Vlad," I stuttered, gripping my knees with my hands and digging my unclipped nails into the skin in a petty attempt to control myself. "Wuh-what are you duh-doing?"

"Shush," he said, very slightly nuzzling the space between my ear and my neck, and I guessed that was the most affection he'd shown in years, if ever. "Relax."

"Stuh-stop!" I cried out, digging my dirt-encrusted nails—nails Jazz told me were those of a hobo, spitefully—into my legs until I'd drawn Ectoplasm.

Again, he hushed me, and continued nibbling, his hands where rested squarely on my stomach keeping me firm in place. I watched his cigarette burn down in his hand, the red tip glowing in the almost-dark that surrounded us.

"Stop!" I said again, my eyes threatening to betray me and release the dam of tears behind them in one swift motion, like a log being swept from its place in the dam the beavers had so meticulously built by the raging waters of a river, releasing that force's complete and total fury. "Let me go!"

He didn't let me go, but briefly, he stopped nibbling, and I could feel his warm, moist breath on the back of my neck, and even this did not keep the phantom hairs down.

For a moment he was silent, thoughtfully so, but then he said slowly, as if still deep in his thoughts, "You don't have to hide it from me, Danny. It's all right."

"Hide it? What are you talking about?" I asked incredulously, my eyes wide with confusion which now mostly replaced my vivid horror, but it was, by no means, disappeared. I was, without question, completely and totally disoriented.

"I'm talking about your homosexuality, Danny," he said matter-of-factly, giving my belly a small squeeze, tempting me to throw up the McMasters' burger I'd eaten for dinner—one I wasn't happy about eating, but, what the hell, we didn't have a McDonald's in Amity.

"What?" was all I could manage to utter.

"You like men, isn't that right?"

I sat there, staring off into the distance, not looking at him—I couldn't if I'd wanted to, truthfully—I didn't think I could bring myself to. I was completely floored, and I didn't know how to respond. Even if I did, I didn't think I'd be capable of formulating those words, so I sat there and watched the trees saw in the strong gusts of wind in total silence.

I didn't think Vlad was waiting from an answer, a response; it seemed to have been more of a statement than an inquiry, I thought, because he shifted me in his lap and drew his cigarette up to his lips and took a long drag in thoughtful silence.

After a few moments, he said again, "Have a drag, Danny. You feel so tense and cold."

"I don't want one."

"And why not?"

"It gives you cancer. Look, I don't know why you think—"

"That's just a myth," he said firmly, shoving the cigarette into my mouth which was agape, in mid-sentence. "Come on, try it."

I involuntarily sucked in a tight breath of air and the thick smoke flooded my lungs. I started to cough, breaking the silence of the night, feeling incredibly dizzy, lightheaded.

Vlad patted me gently on the back. "Don't inhale it. Just take a quick breath, then exhale slowly."

I sat there silently, disbelief washing over me like a wave. Amity's mayor, _my _mayor, supposed uncle, was teaching me how to smoke a cigarette.

"No," I said though my fit of coughs, managing to loosen a hand and yank the papery white tube from between my lips. "I won't do it."

I tossed the cigarette onto the ground and stomped it down with one white-booted foot before Vlad could stop me. He frowned, but he took his cigarette case—a simple steal case that gleamed like a coin in the low light that the streetlamps cast—from where it sat on the bench beside him. He removed a new cigarette swiftly, lit it with a black Bic lighter, and took a drag—problem solved—as he stared at me with eyes that were all-knowing—or so I'd thought then—and thoughtful, eyes that studied my turned face intently, reading me like a psychic, like one of the Gypsies that had once come to Amity Park to make some money reading fortunes or performing tricks or whoring themselves for desperate men; before the police drove them out, I had my fortune read on Sam's suggestion to "do something that wasn't so sickeningly corporate and mainstream, to taste their exoticness", but if I'd really wanted to taste any _exoticness_, I would have spent the ten dollars they took to read my fortune on a quick fuck with one of the sexy Gypsy ladies that rolled into town with the rest of them.

Plainly, Vlad knew—and I'd known he knew, too.

"Danny, tell me," he said, after what seemed like an eternity of staring into my frightened eyes. "You like that Playboy magazine, yes?"

"Yes," I responded immediately, thinking it would dissuade his mind of my homosexuality—because there was none, never had been, or so I'd thought then. "You've seen me reading it."

"As Danny Fenton, yes."

I could only stare at him, drowning in my own helpless confusion. "What?"

"As Danny Fenton, you love that magazine, don't you? You long for those woman, exploited as they are so your cock can become stiff. And it did, didn't it? I felt it."

"Yes," I said softly, my cheeks reddened by a deep, shamed flush.

"But I've never seen you reading such a magazine as Danny _Phantom_."

"What?" I repeated, my throat dry but my eyes wide and wet.

"Danny, you don't read them as a ghost because they don't appeal to you. Isn't that so?"

I paused. "No, they do. It's just that…I don't have time to read them…If I go ghost, it's because I have a job to do…once it's finished, I go back to my human self…"

"But you wouldn't, because as Danny Phantom, you like men, not women."

"What?" I cried hopelessly yet _again_, lost in a sea of dismay, disbelief.

"As Danny Phantom," he repeated slowly, as if he was talking to an idiot, and maybe he was, "you are homosexual. As Danny Fenton, you're not."

I stared at him in that same silent confusion, confusion that mounted my face swiftly and hung on with an iron grip—I was totally lost.

As Vlad would go on to explain this to me, this would not change very much—at least not for awhile. And until then, the need for normality would press down on me relentlessly; the price of a quick fuck with a Gypsy girl was looking better and better.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N:

I'm sorry if there are errors. I haven't started my homework yet and I need to. I will edit it later, likewise with the last chapter.

~VC

* * *

Vlad stared at me, his gaze now more skeptical than anything, skeptical and very inquiring, prodding.

"You haven't noticed this, Danny?"

"No!"

"I'll bet you have," he said gently but certainly. "I have."

"What are you talking about?"

"Danny," he said slowly into my ear, speaking in that fragmented, I'm-talking-to-an-idiot tone of voice. "Listen. I've told you that you don't have to hide this from me. You can be open with me. Now why don't you stop playing dumb?"

"I'm not playing dumb. I have no idea at all what you're talking about."

"Of course you do. You may deny it, but you know. You _feel _it, Danny. And so do I. That is why you shouldn't be so afraid. You can be honest. I'll understand. I promise," he told me softly, encouragingly.

Again, I was left without much ability to talk. Dumbly, I uttered again, "What?"

"We're more alike than you know, Danny," he said. "What your father—that big, unintelligent _lug_—did to us has connected us in more ways than one. We're both halfas, yes, but do you know what that means, really?"

"We're half-human, half-ghost, right?"

"Which are complete opposites, aren't they?"

"Well…yes…"

"You are…_we_ are…incredibly weak without our ghost powers. With them, our strength is tripled. Our hair and eyes are changed—reversed. And even our personalities are changed when we are in our ghost forms. It becomes so much easier to harm someone who deserves it—or maybe who doesn't—when you're Danny Phantom, doesn't it? But as Fenton, you'd never harm that Dash boy, stupid as he may be, would you? You couldn't."

"No," I admitted, still staring off in another, safer direction, "I couldn't."

"But you've harmed him in your ghost form."

"Yes."

"Are you proud of it?"

"No, I'm not, of course not. I don't believe in hurting _anybody_, no matter what they do to you."

"But you do believe in it. At least, as Danny Phantom. Sometimes you may not even remember harming someone or defeating a ghost, for it is something you cannot control. Our emotions are altered greatly in our ghost form. When we change, we do things we may not normally do and cannot help doing so—but it seems we _want _to do them, even if the idea would disgust us as humans. That is why I might come across as rougher when I am around you as Plasmius. I don't mean to harm you to a certain extent, and I certainly don't enjoy doing so, but it is something I simply can't control. It's as if I have a need to fight you in order to survive. When I see you, something goes off inside me, almost as if it can recognize competition, a source of _adrenaline_, when it senses it, and a switch seems to automatically flip. I feel as though I'm an animal—a cat, perhaps, who has mauled its competition when it has smelled a steak thrown out in the back of a supermarket…your father—" He growled, the hand that held me unconsciously tightening, his fingers of the other hand crushing the cigarette between them, burning the gloved appendages. "—look what he's _done_ to us."

I said nothing—I couldn't, because I could recognize with an undeniable clarity that he was right, and that he had _a _right to be angry. I had felt bad for him, I guess, even know I knew he was going to do something to me—_was_ doing something—but I was so disturbed by this rage he kept constantly bottled up inside him, and it hurt me to think he'd been dealing with this for years because of my _father_.

I felt terrible, but I kept silent, not allowing myself to disrupt his fit of anger, even though he was gripping me so tightly I couldn't breathe, and his nails were digging ruthlessly into me. I thought that if I did bother him—or _move_—he might do worse.

But he didn't. He soon seemed to realize what was happening—how his composure had flown out the window—and he sighed and released me with a flash and the machine-like but somehow very whispery noise that followed as he turned back into Vlad Masters. I turned and watched him with wide, wet eyes.

"Don't you see?" he said sadly, putting a hand on my shoulder. "Don't you see how it changes us?"

"Yes," I responded with sadness of the same degree, nodding. "I see."

"It changes us in so many ways, Danny, and one of them is our sexual preference. In our ghost form, what we are attracted to changes just as the color of our eyes does—it reverses. Can you understand that?

"I don't know."

"Do you remember when I saw you at the lake a few months ago? You were there with your friends, and you were sitting with them on a blanket on the sand by the water. You were Danny Fenton, of course. Do you remember what you were doing?"

"No."

"You were staring at that girl. The Latino. Black hair, blue eyes, too much eye-shadow."

"Paulina."

"Yes. Do you remember what she was wearing?"

"A pink bikini bottom. The top had white flowers and—"

"And left very little to the imagination," Vlad interrupted firmly. "The bottom piece, likewise."

"I know."

"And you were staring at her, Danny. You were staring at her ass and her breasts with your eyes glazed over and drool dripping from your open mouth. Underneath your swimsuit you were hard, weren't you, because she was shaking that ass of hers as she ran along the beach after her friend—or maybe her partner, I don't know how you kids like it—that blonde one. Her breasts were bouncing and you were hoping they'd fall out of her bra, weren't you?"

My head hung, eyes fell, and my face flushed. "Yes," I said, feeling ashamed for maybe the first time in my life for such a thing—I'd _never _felt slimy when it came to exploiting women; if they wanted to whore themselves for money or attention, it was fine by me. Great by me, but now I felt shame wash over me and pull me down into its sea like the rising tides and biting undertows of distant oceans. And I did not know why. Maybe it was because I was actually admitting it to someone; a thief might enjoy stealing, a murderer, murdering, but when faced with what they've actually _done_ and its consequences, it becomes a whole other, unpleasant thing.

"But then that ghost came. Do you remember?"

"Yes, I do…Youngblood. The pirate kid."

"He was trying to cause commotion on what he called his 'island.' Strange, that one."

"Tell me about it."

"Well, he must be somewhat formidable, because you ducked inside the bathrooms and changed into Danny Phantom to stop him."

"Yes," I said sullenly.

"Do you remember what happened then?"

"No," I said, even though, in growing horror, I did.  
"You fought him, and within seconds you had him sunk in the lake—an example of our increased strength and altered personality, of course—and you floated in the sky above the beach, waiting for him to resurface. And while you did, do you remember what you saw?"

"No." Again, I did remember, sadly, terribly, I did.

"You saw a young man standing on the beach below you, looking up at you, his mouth agape, his eyes shining in confusion and fear. I remember those eyes. And so do you. You thought they were beautiful, didn't you? Thought his _body_, was beautiful?"

Deeply, he expelled a fat stream of smoke he'd drawn in, his eyes closed, lost in thought, considering again. I thought he was waiting for a response, but before I could say anything, he opened his eyes and said promptly, and somehow charged with a new, bright energy, "How 'bout a drink?"

"What kind?"

"Apple cider." Later, I would learn this "apple cider" was actually apple cider-_flavored_ beer he kept in a flask—and had probably put there just for the occasion because I know now that what he keeps in his steel flask is either whiskey, bourbon, or even cooking sherry if he's desperate for a drink and can't get his hands on the real thing.

"Okay," I'd said, because I was incredibly cold and I thought it'd warm me up some.

But it didn't, because after he'd removed the cap of the flask—odd thermos, I'd thought naively—and handed it to me and I slowly took a drink, I saw that it was cold. Stone cold. And it was bitter.

My face twisted, my nose wrinkled tightly, and I had to keep my mouth shut into order to prevent myself from throwing it up.

"Yuck," I said after I forced it down my throat. "What the hell kind of apple cider is that?"

"You don't like it?" he said innocently. "I made it myself."

"Oh," I said, feeling bad because I thought I had insulted him. "It's…uh…good, actually," I made myself say.

He smiled. "Well, I'm glad. Drink up. It will help us get through this."

That was, of course, a very odd thing to say, or so I'd thought…_then_. I couldn't see how cold apple cider would help me deal with this new revelation, but it became obvious to me shortly after.

I made myself swallow a good amount more, even though it was disgustingly bitter and made my head ache—not like any apple cider _I'd_ ever tasted. I'm now incredibly amazed how compliant I was, considering the circumstances, but I suppose the whole, did-you-know-you're-gay? thing had distracted me sufficiently enough that I wasn't thinking about getting home, in bed so I could be ready to take my tests and give my presentation the next day, and I certainly wasn't thinking about what this all might be leading to. But I should have, and that was my mistake.

He told me to finish off the flask, and I did, trying to be compliant because—distractedly—I felt sad for him. Sad for his pain, sad for his anger at my father, and it felt as if it may have been my duty to make amends, though now I know it wasn't. It couldn't have been; I did nothing to deserve what happened to me that night, what Vlad did to ease his own pain.

I handed him the empty flask, showing him the inside so he'd know I drank it all.

"Good boy, Danny," he said, nipping at my ear again, making me squeak slightly. "That'll make you feel _so_ much better."

"Okay," I said softly, my head pounding from the two bottles of alcohol I'd ingested. I felt incredibly woozy.

"You look tired," Vlad said gently. "Why don't you come home with me and you can rest there for the night?"

"No," I said, trying to be as stern as my whirling head would allow. "I gotta…get home…"

"I don't think that's a good idea, L.B.," he said, his tone very relaxed, and very pleased. It was almost as though I could hear that he was smiling in his voice, even though I was turned so that I could not see his face.

"…not?" I mumbled distantly, staring sleepily into the forest that lie before us, staring but not really looking. "What you talkin' 'bout?"

"You might collapse—faint in the street, that is. You could be hit by a car, robbed…even _raped_, Danny. No, it's best you come home with me for the night."

I can't," I said, barely there. "I need to…need to…"

"Shh," he said soothingly. "Stop talking. There's something we need to do, Daniel. I think now is a good time, now that you're good and drunk."

"Wha…?"

"I can assure you, this will explain everything, Danny. Afterward, there will be no need to say anything else."

With that, he collected his cigarette case, lighter, and flask, shoved them into the pockets of his coat, and picked me up, changing into Plasmius swiftly.

I blacked out.


End file.
